Viewpoint by Medea Benjamin and Alice Slater* Where is the call for the New Peace Deal that would free up hundreds of billions from the overblown military budget to invest in green infrastructure? ask the authors of this article that first appeared on Common Dreams on 12 December 2018. NEW YORK (IDN-INPS) – In the […]
UK’s May Should Announce a New Referendum Immediately
Viewpoint by Jonathan Power* LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – The whole debate about Brexit has had a weird quality about it from beginning to end. Prime Minister Theresa May voted in the referendum two and half years ago to remain in the European Union but then as a quid pro quo for being made prime minister […]
Civil and Political Rights are Also Indivisible Human Rights
Viewpoint by Kalinga Seneviratne SINGAPORE (IDN) – When European gunboats went across the world, Christian missionaries who wanted to “civilize” the people – to whom the Bible was an unknown entity – accompanied the colonizers. Today, when U.S. or NATO missiles rain on countries, Western human rights organisations and their activists follow them, with their […]
Nuclear Weapons and Climate Change Threaten Human Survival
John Avery interviews David Krieger COPENHAGEN | SANTA BARBARA, CA (IDN) – One of the five “M’s” can trigger a nuclear war any time: malice, madness, mistake, miscalculation and manipulation. “Of these five, only malice is subject to possibly being prevented by nuclear deterrence and of this there is no certainty. But nuclear deterrence (threat […]
Silk Road: A Debt ‘Trap’ or an Opportunity for the West Joining China to Assist Developing Countries?
By Dr. Palitha Kohona The author is former Foreign Secretary and former Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations. COLOMBO (IDN) – “Any conflict between the U.S. and China, including a trade war, would do irreparable damage to both, not to mention the rest of the world. However, the two giants have a unique opportunity […]
It is High Time for the U.S. and Russia to Get Off the Treadmill to Catastrophe
Viewpoint by Daryl G. Kimball The author is Executive Director of the Arms Control Association. He wrote this editorial for the December issue of Arms Control Today. WASHINGTON, DC (IDN-INPS) – Earlier this year, UN Secretary-General António Guterres warned that “[t]he Cold War is back…but with a difference. The mechanisms and the safeguards to manage […]
China Not Interested In Any ‘Cold War’
Viewpoint by Shen Dingli The author is a professor at the Institute of International Studies, Fudan University, Shanghai. This article first appeared on China Daily on 4 December 2018. SHANGHAI (IDN-INPS) – Of late, there has been talk of and concern over a possible “Cold War” between the United States and China. The argument goes […]
Significant Progress in Ending All War
Viewpoint by Jonathan Power* LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) – “We need jaw jaw not war war,” said Winston Churchill rather hypocritically. Still, he would be glad to see that the number of wars around the world has fallen dramatically since the end of the Second World War, despite the wars in Korea, Africa, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, […]
UN Chief Calls for Katowice to Lay Down Ground Rules for the Paris Agreement
By António Guterres Following are extensive excerpts from the UN Secretary-General’s remarks at the opening ceremony of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP14) from December 2-14 in Katowice, Poland. KATOWICE (IDN-INPS) – We are in trouble. We are in deep trouble with climate change. Climate change is running faster than we are and we must […]
A Moment of Reckoning for Decentralisation in Morocco
Viewpoint by Yossef Ben-Meir Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir is a sociologist and Founder President of the High Atlas Foundation, based in Marrakech, Morocco, working to establish livelihood advancement projects – all of which are identified and managed by local communities, in partnership with the public, private and civil sectors. MARRAKECH (IDN) – Morocco’s parliament is currently […]